


Justice For A Peasant Whore

by PastaBucket



Category: Xena: Warrior Princess
Genre: Angst, BDSM, Branding, Burnplay, Cannibalism, Catharsis, Eventual Romance, F/F, Guro, Hurt, Knifeplay, Predator/Prey, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Shameless Smut, Suicide Attempt, Torture, Whipping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-05
Updated: 2019-02-19
Packaged: 2019-10-22 16:37:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 6,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17666192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PastaBucket/pseuds/PastaBucket
Summary: Callisto whips Gabrielle on a rack, until they fall in love with eachother.This is a predator/prey pairing that features alternative personalities for both Callisto and Gabrielle.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story features a much different Gabrielle and Callisto than in the series.  
> I'm pretty sure that Gabrielle has alway condemned Callisto as a lost cause (and killing her husband didn't help).  
> Meanwhile Callisto always longed to die, because the whole series had a very weird take on hate in general.  
> My version of Callisto is much more mature than a Xena-blaming guilt-tripper.  
> As I explored in the later chapters, Callisto is really a complicated creature once you get to know her - not quite a psychopath, not quite an avenger, not quite a tortured soul, but something in between - something disturbing, charred and hurting stretched out like a net of flesh across it all, inside her soul.  
> ...and that's where Gabrielle comes in. She fills those empty spaces inside Callisto perfectly, in death after death.  
> I'm kind of jealous.

Gabrielle made no resistance as her naked body was fastened to the wooden rack, her hands tied above her head with leather straps.

"Are you ready to take your medicine?", Callisto smiled eagerly behind her, while coiling her whip.

Gabrielle just silently nodded, in between sobs.

"People like you make me sick.", Callisto spurned. "It will make this all the sweeter."

She swung the whip overhead, and a moment later Gabrielle's body stiffened in pain as the first lash cut a red line across her back, a scream erupting from within her clenched teeth, as tears streamed down her sides.

A second crack soon cut across the first. The third one torn her left butt cheek open as she let out a shriek of anguish. Her whole body shook, both with straining trembles and with the rhythmic wild pounding of her little rabbit heart. She gasped for air as the pain drowned her senses. She deserved this so much. She was just a dirty slut - a bimbo who had no right to crusade against anything.

A fourth lash cut her thoughts asunder, as her other buttock was rendered, followed by another. Befor eshe knew it, she felt a stream of urine trickle down her leg.

"You're so full of shit, Gabrielle, that I almost thought you'd bleed brown.", Callisto smiled as she grabbed Gabrielle's hair and pulled her head back in her grasp, as Gabrielle clenched her eyes from the stinging hurt. "This cleansing is the most honest and brave thing you've ever done, though - I'll give you that."

With that she forced the weaved leather handle of the whip in between Gabrielle's teeth, and began pushing it down into her soft, supple throat.

"Eat it!", Callisto commanded. "Eat it like the big cock slut you are!"

Eager to obey, Gabrielle tried to open her esophagus as wide as she could, but it wasn't until Callisto pushed harder, that she felt it enter fully. Her gag reflex made her throat spasm, coating the handle in slippery saliva, as Callisto rhythmically pushed it onward, mercilessly fucking her as an act of justice. She felt her throbbing pulse extend all the way to her tingling pussy, and knew that it would offer her mistress as little resistance as her throat did.

With a sudden jerk, that sucked up a bit of Gabrielle's stomach contents into her mouth, Callisto janked the ribbed leather handle from her throat. "You are my little willing fucktoy now, Gabby.", she grinned as Gabrielle gasped for breath. "...you whore."


	2. Chapter 2

Gabrielle gave out an amused chuckle. "What? You're just gonna fuck me?"

Callisto frowned at her insolence.

"Look at me, Callisto. Look at my face. See how pretty it is? Of course I'm a whore. It's hard not to be with a fair face like this."

Callisto clenched her Gabrielle's cheeks together with a furious grip around her chin. "Make your point!"

"My point is that your mother didn't die with a face like this, did she?", Gabrielle produced between her fingers.

The force of the slap almost tore the muscles in Gabrielle's neck, and sent her head ringing so much that the knee to her solar plexus came out of nowhere.

Gabrielle spat out the blood and gave her a grin. "You know what you need to do. Just my face won't kill me. There's a fire right over there."

Callisto shivered with rage. The bitch was toying with her and Callisto hated how she wasn't really in control.

As Callisto approached her with the red hot blade, Gabrielle eagerly stretched out her face to meet it. Callisto still made sure to steady her head with her other hand, to keep it from recoiling out of reflex.

As the blade made Gabrielle's cheek sizzle, her lungs emptied in a senseless shriek as the pain make her whole body shake with pain.

...but Callisto just pressed it deeper into her frying flesh, and then slowly began to drag it up across the peasant's forehead. By the time she had crossed it and was making her way down Gabrielle's other cheek, her shriek had transformed into a shivering, mad, broken groan. As her beautiful swan song began to fade into merciful unconsciousness, Callisto finally decided that she was finshed.

"There.", she smiled with satisfaction as she withdrew the instrument. "It's not quite my mother, but I doubt you'll be able to charm anyone with THAT face."

Gabrielle's eyelids fluttered as she struggled to remain conscious. Her head spun as she gasped for air in a searing vortex of agony, that throbbed to the rhythm of her little jumping heart. Somewhere she realized that the numb feeling that she was feeling in her crotch, was the afterglow of an orgasm.

"Thank you.", she panted, her disfigured skin still stinging. "You don't need to hold back. You know I deserve this."

 


	3. Chapter 3

"I don't know what's gotten into you, but I like it.", Callisto smiled. "Maybe we can be friends." She reached out and slowly traced the cauterized surface of Gabrielle's cheek.

Instead of shying away from the pain, Gabrielle responded by affectionately caressing her cheek against her torturer's hand. "More...", she begged. "Please..."

Callisto finally got clued in. She reached her hand down between Gabrielle's squivering legs, and as her fingers slid in between her lips, passing over her clit without resistance, she cracked a smile. "You're wet. It seems I'm not the only one getting off to this." She wrapped her arm around Gabrielle's naked, breathing body, and teasingly ran her tounge up along Gabrielle's throat as Gabrielle winced with disgust. "..., you seductive little hussy.", Callisto whispered into her ear.

Teasingly she closed her lips just under Gabrielle's earlobe in a gentle kiss that sent shivers down her spine. Callisto smiled at the resulting goosebumps, and followed up with a kiss further down her neck, slowly working her way down Gabrielle's entire shivering body, down over her stiff breasts and abs, before raising her thighs up on her shoulders to get to work on her clit. Soon Callisto's deep kisses produced the first moans of passion out of the young bimbo. Gabrielle let them pass her lips without shame. She had desired pain, but not even pleasure was something she wanted to deny her mistress.

Callisto slid two fingers into the tender pussy of the kid, and heard her gasp from the sensation. "Let's see how much of this you can take.", she said, as she began to furiously fingerbang the little cunt. ...but Gabrielle made no signs of displeasure, and soon her moans crescendoed into an orgasm that rocked her whole body, as a warm torrent of ejaculate washed over Callisto's invading hand.

"Not even a whimper.", Callisto commented as Gabrielle struggled to catch her breath. "There's really no trace of shame left in you, is there?"

She stood up again, and studied Gabrielle's groggy, disfigured face as she ran her finger to Gabrielle's blonde hair. "Why? What's wrong with you?"

"I want to die.", Gabrielle mumbled between gasps. "I want you to take everything you want from me. I need to give it to you. I don't know why. Please. Just take it. There's this urge inside of me."

"Interesting. ...and what about Xena?"

"She means nothing to me anymore." Gabrielle's eyes met hers. "I want to please you. I know that you want to do things to my flesh, and so I'm giving it to you. I am yours until death."

Callisto couldn't believe her ears. She wanted to defy the little brat's suicidal desires, but that would be denying her own. She did have so much more to inflict on the little brat. They both yearned for the same thing somehow. She just stared into Gabrielle's sincere eyes. ...and then she leaned in, embraced the brat's naked body, and merged her lips and tounge with hers.

Eager to please, Gabrielle responded as best she could, and as Callisto withdrew, they were both catching their breath.

"You realize that I'm going to break you, in ways that neither of us has imagined yet?", Callisto said, her heart pounding in her chest.

Gabrielle just nodded in response.

Somewhere Callisto felt disgust: This was love. Their hearts both burned in the same flame, together as one. "You've made me love you, you bitch.", she said as she gently stroked Gabrielle's hair.

"I'm sorry.", Gabrielle said. "I didn't mean to."


	4. Chapter 4

Callisto looked up at the starlit sky, her hands interlocked behind her head, relishing at how they burrowed into the ribs of her newfound slave cushion.

"You know", she sighed. "I think I hated you from the moment I saw you. Some idiot that Zena managed to drag out of her home, to compare her overinflated ego with - a gimp, if you will." She feigned readjusting her head by giving her slave a reverse headbutt, and was rewarded with a melodious groan. "An adopted child to lead out into the jungle and fill with lies..."

She turned around to Gabrielle with a faint eager smile. "You know I'm going to kill you, right?"

"When?", Gabrielle breathed. Callisto could hear eagerness in her voice too.

"That's just it: You're just too fun to be with." She pinched one of the little brat's pointy nipples between her fingers and watched as she squirmed. "It's almost as if I wouldn't know what to do without you." She rose. "...and that's why I've decided to keep you. Get up." Gabrielle's stiff body staggered to its feet, embedded twigs and leaves slowly coming off her back. "Come on - on your feet."

She took Gabrielle's hand in hers and lead her over to the backpack. "I've got a gift for you."

The dagger was easy to find, but the metal box was buried at the very bottom. Its contents was perhaps the most precious thing in the world, but it only took a minute amount of it to coat the blade with.

"What is that?", Gabrielle wondered.

"Painful death.", Callisto explained. "...a thousand times over." She held out the dagger, its hilt resting on her navel. "Come here.", she grinned sadistically. "Give me a hug."

A sane person would have at least hesitated. Not Gabrielle. With a hunger to die she threw herself at Callisto, making sure to thrust Callisto's gift deep into her intenstines. Callisto felt the body of the young blonde twist and convulse against the blade, making its edge cut around in new and exciting ways, as Gabrielle struggled to hold back her yelps and screams of suffering. Callisto steadied her shoulders with a firm hand to keep her in place. "What a good girl.", she commended her. "Get it in nice and deep. Don't stop."

It took the idiot several minutes to cease her struggles, realizing they were futile.

She let up to meet Callisto's eyes with a bewildered expression. "Why aren't I dying?"

"You like it?", Callisto smiled. "Here: Let me help you." With that she grabbed the dagger more firmly, and slid it all the way home, up into the little kid's fair heart, slicing it open. She watched as the little blonde made an o-face almost sick with surprise, as she felt her heart rupture, yet still continue to beat. "Now THIS is what the French call 'la petite mort'.", she grinned as the kid struggled to grasp what was going on.


	5. Chapter 5

"Y-you've poisoned me.", Gabrielle finally realized as she staggered backwards, prying at the closing wound with disappointment.

"In a way, yes." Callisto carefully licked her innocent heart off the blade. "I'm not letting you go THAT easily. As Zena's next of kin, you've got a lot to atone for."

Bereft of her final destruction, Gabrielle sank to her knees.

"Do you know how many innocent children died screaming in my village?", Callisto continued. "I'm going to let you experience every one of 'em. ...for every night they've screamed in my head."

She turned around and grabbed one of the pieces of firewood from the campfire. As she turned back to Gabrielle, she found her crawling backwards from her, some traces of survival instinct still commanding her body to flee.

"Hold still, my love. I've got so much to give you.", Callisto smiled. Makeshift torch in hand, she walked up to the brat and sank down on top of her, pinning her from moving further. As the sensitive top of her breast began to sizzle, Gabrielle let out a chord destroying roar of indescribable pain. A few seconds later her other breast was lit on fire, as Callisto rode the child's thigh with her cunt wet from arousal. "I love you so much, Gabrielle. Sing for me!", she purred. "You'll be half charred by lunch time."


	6. Chapter 6

Gabrielle's back arched as Callisto buried the torch in her clit, a guttural groan erupting from her young throat. Just as she reached her peak, Callisto took the wood and, with a feral roar of her own, shoved it all the way up Gabrielle's tender cunt, spearing her womb with all of her might.

With that finale, Callisto rolled over on her back, exhausted. They've been going at it for hours, and whenever she let up, Gabrielle just looking at her with those begging, needy eyes, urging for more. "There's no end to you, is there?", she asked as they both laid there panting, side-by-side.

Gabrielle rubbed her burned clit, mostly to keep it from healing up. Then she turned to her mistress. "You need to rest. I understand."

"Oh come here." Callisto took her in her arms. "I never thought I'd say this, to anyone ever, but you make me so happy." She kissed the kid's forehead in genuine affection before holding her naked fleshtoy against her chest.

"It's all I ever wanted.", Gabrielle whimpered. "You feel so broken inside."

Callisto smiled, amused at her folly. "Well good luck fixing me, sweetie."

"I'm fixing myself too.", Gabrielle sobbed. "You, out of anyone, know how little I deserve to live."

Callisto brushed her bitch's hair, looking at her crept up to her chest, sparkling tears streaming down her healed cheeks. She was right. Nobody else would dare to lay a hand on her. Maybe they really were perfect for eachother.

"Look:", she comforted her. "Let's eat, and then we'll see how flammable that hair of yours is, okay?"


	7. Chapter 7

"Gabrielle..." Callisto's voice trembled with desire. "I want inside you."

Gabrielle responded with a faint, knowing smile at the sight of the dagger, and brushed her hair aside to expose her brittle neck as a sign of consent.

Callisto gave out a sigh of relief as she pierced the supple skin and plunged the full length of the blade inside. Gabrielle coughed and gargled in vain attempts to keep her lungs from filling with her own blood, while Callisto made little delighted sawing motions to carve open her neck. She could see Gabrielle's blood bellow forth in little dark torrents to the rhythm of her still beating heart as she slid the knife over her ribcage to open up her belly. "Hold still.", she told her, but the blonde was already losing consciousness, and soon after she hit the ground in a lifeless pose that grew paler by the minute.

Callisto swore. She'd wanted Gabrielle to experience this, as she grabbed the sides of the gash and tore the skin open to expose her innards. She decided to pause for a few minutes, waiting for the neck would to heal up.

"Welcome back to the living, sweetie.", she said as Gabrielle stirred awake. "I'm going to have to feed you more ambrosia if you're going to pass out on me like this."

"No, I'm fine.", Gabrielle protested, still a bit groggy. She looked down at her exposed organs.

"Disgusting, isn't it?", Callisto smiled as she traced Gabrielle's large intestine over the lumps of her still processing food.

"I'm so sorry.", Gabrielle pleaded with utter shame in her voice.

Gabrielle winced from painful nausea as Callisto unpacked a bit of entrail from her. Holding it up in her hand, Callisto smelled it, before making a disgusted face. "Phew! You reek."

Gabrielle just covered her face in her hands from the embarrassment. "Please kill me!", she desperately pleaded.

Ignoring her pleas, Callisto grabbed the dagger and got back to work, carefully opening her up further down, and soon laying bare the idiot's little uterus. Tracing a finger over it, Callisto made the little wench give out a sudden gasp and, while clenching her hands against the ground, howl with a sudden sensation that she just couldn't place.

"You're fun to play with.", Callisto confessed as she felt the little organ contract into a throbbing orgasm, Gabrielle arching her back so much that her entrails were on the virge of falling out and spilling everywhere. Callisto place a hand on her abdomen to prevent just that. "Careful, you little bitch. You'll ruin yourself."


	8. Chapter 8

"It's a mish-mash of flesh, really.", Callisto explained in response to her question. "You know how poetry often doesn't make any sense, but you're still fine with it none-the-less? Well now imagine the entire world being just poetry. That's what it feels like." She carved a little opening and leaned to surple a taste from between Gabrielle's supple breasts.

Gabrielle brushed her killer's hair with a smile as Callisto rested her head at one of her two natural body pillows. Like this Callisto looked almost tame. She still had the occational fit where she'd just start stabbing her, but in between there was a calm where she showed her an affection eerily resembling a small child's. That was the one thing that Gabrielle was proud over: Having managed to please her mistress. All she needed to do was suffer. She could do that. She YEARNED to do that.

"It feels like it's EVERYBODY ELSE who's lost their minds.", Callisto said, staring in front of her while casually carving the outer layers of skin on Gabrielle's stomach. "...and it FEELS! SO! UNFAIR!", she erupted, punctuating every word with a stab so deep into Gabrielle's gut that her legs spasmed about.

Callisto withdrew the blade. "I really need to stop being so impulsive. I feel like we were having a genuine moment there for a sec." She wiped the blood and half-digested feces off on Gabrielle's thigh, and turned to face Gabrielle with a somewhat concerned expression for her victim. "Does it hurt?"

Gabrielle winced. "I've had worse."

"I'm a monster, aren't I?" For the first time she saw actual shame from Callisto.

"Don't worry about it. I like you that way.", Gabrielle comforted her. "It's like when you took my virginity: It hurts the most the first time, because you're scared. After that, you learn to let go."

"I don't understand why I'm like this. ...or what I'd do without you.", Callisto told her. "I love to kill you perhaps even more than I'd like the idea of killing Xena." She got back to resting her head back on Gabrielle's pillows again. "It's nuts."


	9. Chapter 9

"How are you feeling, love?" Callisto studied Gabrielle's wincing face as she laid over her.

"Everything is just a red miasma of pain. I'd rather die than move."

"What if I commanded you to?", Callisto smiled with a glint of sadism.

"They I hope you'll punish my insolent disobedience by giving me as slow and painful of a death as you can imagine.", Gabrielle groaned from the pain. "Unfortunately dead girls move even less."

"I love you, Gabrielle.", Callisto smiled with genuine appreciation.

"Please don't say things like that. I'm just a whore."

"Yes, but you're MY whore.", Callisto smiled.

"Until death and beyond." Gabrielle winced through the pain. "I'll die a thousand deaths for you."

"You look so beautiful when you die." Callisto gently caressed her cheek. "I think I love killing you more than anything in the world."

"Callisto?", Gabrielle wondered with a shy tone in her voice. "Have you ever wondered what my breasts would taste like?"

Callisto grabbed one of the fat sacks and squeezed them in her hand.

"There's a lot of fat in them,", Gabrielle continued. "but I imagine that if you fry them, they'll taste like pork."

"You really hate them, don't you?" Callisto yanked playfully at her nipples, making the whole thing jump up and down.

"They're part of me, but I don't think they're as full of shit as the rest of me, so they're probably good enough to eat. ...if you want to try 'em."

Callisto rose up and got her dagger. She placed the first cut underneath the sack, just enough to slice the skin, and soon enough she was able to remove it to expose the jellylike fat substance underneath.

"Oh my god, don't look at it!", Gabrielle protested at Callisto inspected her. "I look so ugly!"

"Hey, shut up or I'll have both of 'em for myself." She poked the tissues with fascination.

"Will they grow back?", Gabrielle wondered.

"Probably. We'll see. I like the idea of having you as a neverending food source. ...like my livestock."

"You're making me so wet.", Gabrielle confessed. "I wanna be your cow."

Callisto took a plate and began cutting Gabrielle's breast up into four large cake pieces.

"Those pieces are pretty large.", Gabrielle said as Callisto began working on her other breast.

"Yeah, but as with all fat, they'll shrivel up into smaller bits as they fry. Don't worry.", Callisto explained.


	10. Chapter 10

Callisto's teeth tore off another chunk. She looked up at Gabrielle and her bandaged, flat frame, as they both munched away. "Do you miss her?"

She could see the fear light up in the brat's little eyes. "Do you really want to know?"

Callisto gave her an amused smile, still chewing her breast tissue between her teeth. "Will I kill you before you've even finished your meal, if you say yes?", she rephrased Gabrielle's question.

"It's not that.", Gabrielle explained. "It's just that I don't want to hurt your feelings."

"You're ashamed, aren't you?", Callisto smiled before she took another bite.

Gabrielle lowered her eyes and silently nodded with honesty.

"We both do.", Callisto comforted her. "...in our own way." She made an effort to keep herself calm as the queen bitch flashed before her eyes, and looked out into the surrounding landscape. "It's all she does, isn't it? ...strides into town, makes her demands, takes what she wants... ...and we're just left in her wake, really."

She turned to face Gabrielle again, who just sat there listening. "Have you figured out why she's on her big redemption tour yet?"

Gabrielle tried shaking her head.

"Her sudden, graceful change of heart...", Callisto mocked. "See, at first I figured that it was just a ruse - a way to rally support, either for some great exploitation, or for genuine power consolidation. ...or maybe she figured she'd made too many enemies and burned too many bridges. ...figuratively speaking. ...but you know, I think she honestly believes her own bullshit."

Gabrielle silently lowered her head in shame.

Callisto laughed. "A 'champion for good'! 'Setting things right'!"

"She... She is genuinely sorry for what happened.", Gabrielle mumbled to her defense.

"So what if she is?" Callisto's face was grimly serious again. "I'm not."

Gabrielle gave her a confused expression.

"Burning down Cirra was the most honest thing that Xena's ever done." She put the last piece of Gabrielle in her mouth and tossed the plate on the ground. "...and there's no amount of bullshit she could tell me to make me regret it." She turned to Gabrielle. "I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for her. ...or maybe I would, and somebody else would be having MY breasts for dinner."


	11. Chapter 11

"Sorry for my little rant earlier.", Callisto said from her horse to Gabrielle's. "I think the less we concile our differences, the better. We fit better that way."

"I just want to console you in any way I can."

"That's cute, dear. Console away to your heart's desire. I like it."

Gabrielle sank a bit in her saddle.

"Oh what is it now?" Callisto held in her horse with annoyance. "Look, what has she told you? That I'm broken and lonely? That all I need is a hug?" She pouted her lower lip in a mocking display. "It's not that I don't appreciate all you're doing for me - I really do - but YOU're the one who needs saving - not me."

"How can you SAY that?", Gabrielle objected with a frown. "I've watched you stirr in your sleep. You sound like a wounded animal half the time."

"Do I?" Callisto made a mental note to not sleep next to anyone she couldn't kill afterwards. "Well, I guess you could say that a wounded animal keeps its senses sharp." She gave Gabrielle's wounded frame a condemning look. "Well, one with any self-preservation instincts anyway." She turned to carry on.

"So it does bother you then?", Gabrielle said at her back.

She turned again. "Well, I'm not keeping you around for my amusement, if that's what you're thinking. We all have our issues."

"She killed your family!" Gabrielle caught herself.

Showing restraint, Callisto got down from her horse and walked over to hers. "Let's continue this conversation away from the horses, shall we?"

"I-I'm sorry.", Gabrielle protested with a wounded expression, but did as Callisto commanded.

Callisto escorted her away enough to not spook the animals, before she pinned Gabrielle between her and a tree, baring her teeth. "You like to poke the hornet's nest, don't you?"

Gabrielle just silently whimpered in response.

"My family lived under a roof of straw.", she spit at her. "They all did. ...just waiting for somebody to come along and torch them, including their children. Now tell me who's crazy."


	12. Chapter 12

Lying on her back, and looking up at the grey evening sky, a childish fascinated joy played over Callisto's face, raindrops falling into her open smile.

"You're acting like you've never seen rain before.", Gabrielle commented from under her coat.

"I feel like I haven't." Callisto shook the water out of her eyes, before laying herself to rest on her back with her hands behind her head. "It's soothing for the soul."

"You'll catch a cold."

Callisto turned to look at her, her face still lost in bliss. "Come here, sweetie."

Gabrielle hesitated to crawl out from under her shelter.

"...or maybe I should call you Grumpy, going by your mood all afternoon."

Gabrielle finally joined her. "We're both going to be sick now."

Callisto caught her in a cold wet embrace. "No we won't." She poked Gabrielle's nose tip with happy affection. "We're gods - remember?"

"What are you talking about?"

"It doesn't matter." Callisto pressed Gabrielle to her chest and gave out a happy sigh, looking up at the sky. "When I was born, the fields blossomed with a new kind of grass. ...as its former green shell burned away, it bloomed in black and red. ...but like all flowers, it needs water to live. ...water to quench its thirst."

She could feel Gabrielle starting to shiver against her body and just hugged her closer, squeezing out water from the fabric between them. "It'll be alright.", she happily sighed, with an arm around her underling's shoulders.


	13. Chapter 13

Finishing stirring the campfire, Gabrielle looked up at her mistress. "Have you tried NOT to hate?"

Callisto laughed. "What is this - an intervention?"

"I just figured that all that bitterness inside of you, must be eating you up.", Gabrielle persisted.

"Yes.", Callisto admitted with a straight face. "It does. It's like a hunger, that some feel more than others. It like a fire: You either learn to harness it, or you get consumed by it."

"It doesn't have to be that way.", Gabrielle told her. "I'm here for you."

Callisto smiled at her. "Oh Gabby, you don't understand, do you? Pain and hate is a gift. I makes you grow. It burns away the weak parts and hardens you. It creates warriors out of villagers. Without it to motivate me, well, I'd turn into... ...you. A soft little rabbit whose only defense is a stick."

"Hey!", Gabrielle frowned at her insult.

"Tsk-tsk. Don't hate.", Callisto scorned her mockingly.

"Sometimes I don't even know why I bother with you."

"Because you're a moth to a flame. It's in your nature. ...and besides, I'd just catch you if you ran away. For a rabbit, you're not very quick." She looked at Gabrielle with a smile. "I dare you to try, though..."


	14. The Rescue

"Don't move."

Callisto opened her eyes from her nap. She would recognize that bitter voice anywhere. Right now the bitch stood poking the tip of her blade right into her throat, as if that mattered.

"Where's Gabrielle?", she growled again.

"I dunno. Around?", Callisto mumbled absently.

"Her horse and staff is still here, so she's nearby."

"I can help you look, if you want?", Callisto suggested.

She got no reply back.

"...or we can just lie and stand here for a while - whatever suits you.", Callisto yawned and closed her eyes again. "Wake me when you find her."

"Get up!", Xena ordered.

Callisto staggered to her feet, the blade still trained at her. She was soon spun around and felt rope being tied around her wrists behind her back.

"If you've harmed as much as a hair on her head, you'll pay in kind.", Xena continued to growl as she made sure the restraints would hold.

Callisto held back a smile, remembering all the things she'd done to Gabrielle. All the unimaginable ways that she'd touched her.

"Now take me to her!"

"Gabrielle?!", Callisto called out into the woods. "Xena's here! She's come to take you home!"

"Is this your idea of a joke?"

Callisto turned to her nemesis with an honest but amused expression. "I honestly don't know where she is."

"Gabrielle!", Xena shouted. "It's me!"

There was movement as Gabrielle emerged from her hiding spot.

"Don't! Stop!", she commanded before Xena could set off toward her.

"Gabrielle, it's me.", Xena repeated in confusion.

Callisto nailed Gabrielle with her eyes, grinning sadistically. "You have to choose, Gabrielle."

"Xena..." Gabrielle clenched her teeth to hold back tears. "Go."

"Wha-what's going on here?" Xena turned to see Callisto start giggling. "What have you done to her?!"

"You heard her.", Callisto laughed. "The little brat has made her decision."

Still laughing, Callisto was kicked to the ground as Xena raised her sword to skewer her.

"No! Don't!" Gabrielle's cry froze Xena. "She's not done anything!"

"What's the meaning of this? You can't seriously mean that you're staying. ...with HER!", Xena roared.

"Xena..." Gabrielle shook her head as tears trailed down her cheeks. "You don't understand. I have to."

"Why?!"

"She... She needs me."

"*I* need you! What could she possibly need you for?!"

"Xena... I'm sorry. It has to be this way.", Gabrielle cried. "I love you."

Xena put a furious boot into Callistos cackling side in order to silence her. "This isn't over."

Callisto turned over on her back to smile at her enemy. "Not quite the reunion you were hoping for, huh?"

Xena turned back to Gabrielle. "At least tell me why."

"I'm not sure that you'll understand."

"Try me."

"I'm able to please her.", Gabrielle said. "This is the only way to end the cycle of violence."

Xena shook her head, barely understanding. "Not like this."

"She needs sacrifice, Xena.", Gabrielle explained further. "She needs someone to pay. She won't stop until she's got either you or me, and I'm the only one willing and able to do it."

Xena visibly trembled with helpless rage. She looked at Callisto's bare neck, so easy to cleave. She was held back by knowing that Gabrielle would never forgive her for it.

"You... ...win.", she finally mumbled to Callisto in defeat. "I can't believe this."

"Believe it, Xena. She's MY bitch NOW.", Callisto smiled.

Xena raised a fist aimed at her face.

"No! Stop!", Gabrielle shouted. "Please! Don't make this any harder than it has to be. ...for ALL of us."

Xena felt so lightheaded that she could hardly stand. "Promise me you'll take care of her.", she pleaded with the maniac blonde.

"You heard the kid. I'm not making any promises."

"This is insane!", Xena cried out.

 

Fifteen minutes later, as the pair sat around the campfire, they heard Xena's distant roar of loss echo far away down the road.

"You know,", Callisto said. "you're a brave kid. That was a tough decision."

She wrapped an arm around Gabrielle as Gabrielle leaned her head against her shoulder. It was a new, uncomfortable feeling that Callisto felt, of actually feeling an intimate respect for the little lamb.

 

I dunno - The End?


	15. Epilogue?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is going to be just angst and shit.

"Gabrielle, come here."

Again Callisto's face was twisted into a strange look of sympathy that just looked out of place on her face. Once Gabrielle was with reach, Callisto pulled her green top over her head and started undoing the redstained bandage underneath.

...but instead of harming her, Callisto genuinely started examining her chest, stretching her skin and brushing away the few remaining scabs that would come loose.

"They've almost healed.", she concluded. "I don't think they'll even scar."

"Callisto, is everything alright? It's been days since you last hurt me."

Callisto looked up at her. "No.", she said. "Everything is NOT alright. You've started to grow on me. ...like a fungus." She frowned in disgust.

"I can try to MAKE you hate me if you want."

Callisto thought about it. "I don't think that'll help. Put your top back on. I don't think you need the bandages anymore."

"Can we talk about it?"

"What is it with you and -...?", Callisto grimached. "Fine. We'll talk."

"I feel like you've changed."

"Go on?" Callisto gave her a distrustful look.

"Well, have you?"

Callisto maintained her hostile look and didn't answer her.

Gabrielle waited a while, before understanding that this wasn't the way to communicate. Instead she did something she couldn't explain why: She reached out a finger and poked Callisto on the tip of her nose. "Boop!"

The next thing she knew was a grip clenching around her throat and the back of her head hitting a tree. There was the beast she had come to know.

"What the fuck do you think I am - some kind of toy?!", Callisto yelled in her face. "Some kind of animal to domesticate?!" Callisto was so furious she was almost frothing. Lacking further words, she just threw Gabrielle on the ground.

...but nothing more was coming. Not even so much as a kick.

Gabrielle just got up and brushed the dirt off her. "You're getting weaker."

Callisto nodded shamefully, before sinking down on the ground.

"You know, I have a staff. I can probably pummel you until you kill me."

"Gabrielle, just... ...stop, please." Callisto curled up, hugging her boots.

Gabrielle sat down beside her. There were tears making their way down Callisto's cheeks.

"I swear to the gods if you try to cling onto me, I'll kill you!", she growled defensively.

Not really threatened by that promise, Gabrielle still kept her distance, as Callisto just stared ahead of her, out into the woods. "You look almost sick.", she concluded.

It took a while before her owner responded, in a soft, mumbling voice. "I'm not in control of you anymore, am I? I can feel your kindness, worming its way into my heart. ...breaking it down."

Gabrielle tried reaching out for her shoulder, but quickly withdrew it when she was met with a hateful hiss.

"I can try to annoy you, but somehow I don't think that would help.", Gabrielle concluded.

Callisto inhaled her snot again, and wiped her eyes. "No, actually, that's a good idea. Come here - sit. Maybe we DO need to talk."

Once they sat facing eachother, Callisto looked straight into her eyes, and continued. "You know why I hate you, don't you?"

"I... ...think I have a rough idea what it's about - yes."

"I knew how to snare rabbits, but the biggest catches were on the main roads. If I were lucky, I would find some wagon driver who'd take pity on me enough to stop and offer me a ride, out of the kindness of his heart. ...and when he turned his back, I would cut that heart out of him." Callisto's voice still echoed with murderous determination between clenched teeth.

"Some of them must have been fathers with families of their own.", she continued, before completely cracking open into tears of utter despair. "I had to eat, Gabrielle! I had nothing! I didn't know what to do!"

Gabrielle made another attempt at a hug, but Callisto raised a hand to stop her in her tracks.

Callisto swallowed down her tears again. "...and that's why I hate you. ...because while you learned things like how to read and write, I learned anatomy, and betrayal. I hate you because you're so fucking STUPID." Her voice began quivering. "...and maybe because I would have wanted to be stupid too."

"Callisto," Gabrielle's voice was dead serious. "you are going to have to kill me now, because I'm going to hug you no matter what." She wrapped her arms around the tense, curled up package of shivering warrior, but Callisto didn't move.

"It felt like the whole universe had pulled its rug out underneath me, and was just mocking and laughing at me.", Callisto mumbled. "Because even as a child, I knew how utterly fucked my whole life was going to turn out without a family to support me."

"You survived.", Gabrielle comforted her.

"It's not a matter of just surviving, Gabrielle. I had to make do with what I had - build some kind of imitation of a life with sticks and stones and steel and blood. It's survival, alright. No more - no less. The people I encountered didn't."

She buried her chin in her knees as Gabrielle continued to sliently embrace her. "I doubt I've murdered more people than Xena has, but I've murdered enough to forfeit my own life. In the end it just became a way of life - survival of the fittest. I've never thought twice about it. ...until now."

"Should I stop? ...hugging you, I mean?"

"You're going to be the death of me.", Callisto said softly, but showed no signs of shaking her off. "I'm feeling all soft and fuzzy inside."

"I have that effect on people.", Gabrielle smiled kindly.

"I don't understand how you can be such a murder groupie.", Callisto chuckled.


End file.
